Bendy Bags and Seam Rippers

There's been quite a lot of sewing going on over the last few weeks, just not any blogging about it - until 2 days ago, anyway.
I made my first Bendy bag a few weeks ago.

This one came together beautifully, I read the pattern carefully and worked my way through step by step, without any problems. The only problem was the sewing machine which misbehaved and was traded away.
Number Two wasn't quite so easy, operator error. I obviously didn't pay close enough attention to the instructions, but it turned out well, too.

The third one, though, ..... well, let's not go into details other than to say everything that could go wrong did go wrong. Not the pattern's fault, partially again, not paying close enough attention and partially the material. It's ............ oh, no ................. pleather. Not really that hard to work with, but not as easy as quilting cottons.

All those problems notwithstanding, I love this bag. This one is definitely mine.

One thing I haven't quite resolved in my mind (a lot of my sewing prep goes on in my head) is the issue of thread color. I like to use matching thread whenever possible. So, that's brown for the zipper and the seams, but after changing threads back and forth several times while cleaning up the seams on the inside in the first two bags, I got tired of it and just stuck with brown on this one. I wonder how anybody else making these bags handles that issue.

I can highly recommend the pattern, it's a pretty quick project and the result is just plain good and enjoyable. Love the way the leftover zipper is used as a tab. Any problems I encountered were not in any way related to the pattern. And I will definitely make more, not that I need more bags.

As I said, I ran into problems, especially with the last bag and the seam rippers and I got to be really good friends.
My husband took up wood turning last year and after making lots of pens of various kinds and moving on to bowls and hollow vessels and segmented bowls (I really need to write a blog post about his projects), he made me a couple of seam rippers which where quick projects. He has also moved from wood to stone and used a slice left over from one of my pens to embellish my newest seam ripper.
I like that they are safe, you just pull out the whole metal piece and pop it into the opening backwards, no danger of poking yourself.
So, here are my new best friends:

Pattern used: Bendy bag by Lazy Girl.
Fabrics: mostly out of my embarrassingly large stash, except for the pleather which was bought just for this project.

Toddler Skirt

I bought this cute fabric last year, planning to make a two-layer skirt for my granddaughter ............. and promptly misplaced it. Didn't find it again until a couple of weeks ago.

The most difficult part of making the skirt was the cutting out. It just about did my head in. I wanted to maximize the design and wanted to center it, but that just wasn't possible. I think it worked out and everything afterward was a breeze.
I used my own tutorial and had to actually refer to it a couple of times. It's been a while since I made a granddaughter skirt. I used French seams for the side seams, folded the hem over twice and, because of the way the skirt is constructed for the casing, there is not a single raw edge to be found.
The new machine threw a wobbly yesterday and I just about panicked, but I stayed calm, called the sewing machine store and the nice mechanic talked me through an easy fix. Whew!

Fabric used: Wee Wander by Michael Miller Fabrics
Pattern: a combination of this tutorial and this tutorial.

Sew Together Bag

This, finally, turned from UFO into finished. I am late to the party, as usual. There are beautiful Sew Together Bags all over the web.

This is actually my second bag, the first one is a lot more colorful and, as yet, hasn't been photographed. It'll happen. I've also made a mini bag and can't lay my hands on it at the moment.

This particular bag languished in the "to be finished" pile for months. And I have a good excuse. Sewing machine No. 1 sort of gave up its ghost. Even after servicing there were problems, stitches skipped, it seemed much less powerful than it had been. So, it was traded in for a fancier model which also developed problems. Another trade and a big learning curve. The machine and I seem to be making friends, though, and I finally buckled down and finished this bag. There wasn't much left, only the last zipper had to be sewn in.

I frequently consulted the tutorial in sew along form from the Quilt Barn. The pattern is good, but a little extra help is called for on occasion.

There are more sew together bags in the pipeline. Partially sewn, cut out, stacks of fabrics co-ordinated. They'll all be done in time. It's not an easy project and it takes some time, but the result is so worth it.

Pattern: Sew Together Bag.
Tutorial to go along with the pattern: Sew Along.

Point Reyes

Quite a few pictures, not so many words.
We decided on Point Reyes for our latest trip to the ocean. We had done the Southern part recently, this time we headed North, hoping to find a path down to a beach we had visited before. We lucked out, found it, McClure Beach.

I did not get any pictures of the elk, I was planning on that for the return trip by which time the whole herd - and there were quite a few of them - had moved on. Oh well, maybe next time?

The path that looks so harmless in the first picture is actually quite steep and a long ways up and down.

Wrote a name or two in the sand.

Carefully crept through a gap in the cliffs. L pointed out that the rocks on either side looked totally different, brown on the left, grey on the right. Most likely caused by an earthquake, the San Andreas fault in extremely close to all this.

And found this beach which is probably only accessible at low(ish) tide.

Here is a bit about the cattle ranches on Point Reyes. At the bottom of the page is a link to a map, I think we've driven by them all over the years.

After that slightly strenuous hike up and down the cliff and a nice walk on the beach, lunch was at Cafe Reyes where we had delicious wood fired pizza and a complimentary Florentine - also delicious. No pictures, we were much too hungry to wait.

And this followed us home:

To the sea

Almost wordless .........................

I didn't realize that going to Bodega Head was dangerous.
Just a few selected photos from today's trip to the ocean. 

 

See the beach in the picture above?

Here is the path that leads down to it. Seems to end at the top of a sheer cliff and I am obviously not going to try it, but we have seen people on that beach.

A memorial to the fisherman - up on the cliff where we hike.

 View towards Bodega Bay, the sun came out for just a little while, 30 minutes later, the marine layer rolled back in, along with the tide.

This the view towards Doran Beach, a day use park that was completely full today.

 I wonder what's behind the gate. I've never seen it open.

Long time no see

It's been ages since my last blog post. Not that there hasn't been anything going on here, there's just not been any blogging.
There's been a lot of sewing, but no pictures. I joined a doll club last fall and have been doing quite a bit of mass production sewing and, by now, I am a bit burned out. I can only sew so many dinosaurs, car carriers, baby doll diapers and bibs and little tote bags. On top of that, I've also sewn a bit for the little granddaughter, but, again, not a lot of pictures.
There have been trips to the ocean, both for whale watching and hiking and there were pictures taken but those ended up on Facebook. If you're a FB friend of mine, you've seen all of those.
The ones below are new, taken last weekend on yet another trip to Bodega Bay. There was a bit of this:

Whale watching, that is. I am getting better at spotting whales, even though they are quite far out right now. Give it a few weeks and mums and babies will swim much closer to the shore and it'll all be much more interesting.
There was also a bit of fairly harmless hiking - not quite so harmless a few weeks ago in Muir Woods. The hike wasn't that difficult (4 miles with an elevation of 500 feet), but my knees still complain on occasion. I either need to do more or less of it. I'm leaning towards more.

Some of the hike was like this, gently sloping up or downhill with lots of smaller flowers all over, with a few of these thrown in:

A very enjoyable hike, not very strenuous, followed by a delicious lunch of prawns and chips at one of our favorite places in Bodega Bay.

Another beady giveaway

More cleaning up and clearing out going on.
First up, two heart pendants:

The on on the left is fused, made by, I believe Jeanne Kent, the one on the right is lampworked by, I think, Cheryl Keggan.
Next is a pendant by Kate I-don't-remember-her-last-name - sorry. She used to sell on ebay many, many years ago:

Leave a comment here (or on my facebook page if you are one of my FB friends). The drawing will be sometime this weekend.

More earthquake pictures

I mentioned the little white house that was knocked off its foundation in a previous post, didn't get a picture that time. Today I did:

I thought it was a total teardown, but there was somebody working on it, talking to people explaining how he was going to bring it back to life. I hope you can do it, it looks like it'll need a miracle.

And while I'm already writing ............. L and I decided to walk through downtown Napa after lunch today. There are still roads blocked off - for safety reasons, the Post Office looks the same as before, except this time I saw that both doorways are in very tough shape and that plenty of the beautiful old windows are broken. Plenty of other buildings are also damaged. There is activity almost everywhere. Quite a few of the remaining stores are open again, whether they have windows or a board nailed across the window opening.
What I found really sad, though, (apart, obviously, from the damage to so many beautiful old buildings) is that the downtown, the pedestrian mall was a total ghost town. And not because of earthquake damage. All the stores, except for Kohl's and McCaulou's were boarded up with signs announcing that things were in the process of being re-done. There's supposed to be a big hotel and upscale stores. When I moved to Napa, years ago, downtown was thriving. There were small, independent, interesting stores, little restaurants. They are all gone. I keep hearing rumors about raised rents, people being forced out because these stores don't fit in with somebody's vision. Sad!

Bangles and charms

This is what I was doing before the earth shook:

All made in an online class with Riki Schumacher via Artful Gathering. A very informative and enjoyable class.
I am still missing one of the other charms I made, need to look for it some more.

I also took two other classes at Artful Gathering that were a great learning experience. Riveting with Keith LoBue and Romancing the Past with Debby Anderson which was full of new and exciting techniques.